Welcome to the MyCE review thread everyone. This thread is intended to give our members a chance to show us some of their favorite equipment, whether it is related to their computers, phones, cameras, personal electronics, their home audio/visual gear or something completely different that we cannot anticipate. (nothing X rated by the way!)

A picture of the equipment should be included in the review, but the review itself need not be elaborate. A paragraph or two describing it, why you chose it and how much you like the gear will be sufficient. Of course, if you want to be more elaborate, that would be fine as well.

The only other caveat is that the equipment should still be available for sale to the general public at the time of the post.

And so we get down to it. The first review in this thread, as promised to some, this will be an examination of some headphones that I own.

I've had a set of Koss Porta Pro headphones for some time, but recently had them lose sound in the left earpiece. Koss has an excellent lifetime warranty for their headphones however, so I sent them back in to be repaired. Koss didn't actually repair them...they sent me a new set. But in the interval between sending and getting them back, I decided to explore a bit and see if I could find some reasonably priced headphones with a slightly different sound.

Here are the Koss headphones:

Funky, and no one's idea of sleek cool looks, the Porta Pro's are actually pretty good headphones in their price range ($30). Fairly prominent bass, decent mid range and the higher end...well it falls off, but this means you can listen to them without much fatigue to your ears. They are also extremely light and comfortable.

Here's what I got to go with them: These are the Grado SR 60i headphones. They are also archaic looking, and wouldn't look out of place in a 1940's movie, but the sound is unique. Grado's don't pretend to be neutral headphones. They have a definite coloration to their sound, with an emphasis on the mids and high tones. For rock, electric guitar and female vocals, these things really shine. The Grado's are not without flaws however. They are so bright in sound that they can wear you out after a couple of hours of listening. They are also purposely in-your-face with their presentation, meaning you feel like you are on the front row of the rock concert. Grado's aren't the best easy listening headphones available.

The other flaw...comfort. The pads that come with the SR60i's are called Comfies. Right. Only if you like scrubbing pads on your ears. I tried several different types of pads, even made my own at one point, but it finally came down to just getting inured to the on ear feeling of pads. I use the Sennheiser 414 pads now, in a reverse quarter mod. This is what they look like:

Both the Grado's and Porta Pro's lack soundstage, which is a feeling of width, depth and height in the sounds coming at you. This can be an issue if you use headphones to play games or watch movies. So, I became interested in a set of Panasonic headphones that were getting rave reviews at some of the headphone sites online. They are the Panasonic RP HTF-600S, shown here:

These are semi-open cans, unlike the first two which are completely open. They cost $30 shipped. The Panasonics feel cramped in comparison, boxed in, which I didn't really expect. The sound was also a disappointment, with excessive bass that overwhelms the lower mids, and muffled mid tones above that. The best comparison I can make is that listening to music with them is rather like looking at scenery through a very dirty window. They aren't a complete loss however, as they do work for gaming quite well, and I've set up my spare computer for my nephew to play games when he comes over. So, he's enjoying them, and the bass will reverberate your ears when you get into combat situations in first person shooters.

So that's it. If you have any comments, or questions, feel free to jump in.

Hi there, Kerry open the door by not saying it had to be electronic and because it being close to the turkey season my only new purchase is this oilless turkey cooker.I've not used it yet but will let you know after I use it.You can cook up to a 16 lb bird but takes 2hrs to cook.We have a turkey cooker that use oil but it's a waste if you only use it a couple times a Year. ( I paid 35 dollars for a 4-5 gal container last year.) And it took time to heat the oil up to 350 degrees.Now the cooker took some time to but together 35-60 minutes for me and the cooker cooks by propane gas and it's heat is call infrared cooking .The cooker is a Charbroil brand comes with a little cook book with recipes and hints.a meat thermeter and a grease tray . Now if anyone has used one please feel free to let me know and let us know how you like it.

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If you have a pc connected to your home television/cinema set and would like to casually operate it from the comfort of your couch, then this is the device you need.

It's cheap, it's usb and it's wireless. No drivers necessary.

On my test machine (A Pentium IV, 1GB with Windows XP Pro SP3 on it) it works flawlessly. It is completely 100% compatible with XBMC, which turns your (old) personal computer into a home cinema player that can even playback .IMG dvd images.

The mouse part responds a bit laggy, but is perfect. As long as you don't need to type this is a perfect remote for browsing, playing media or just do some casual copy/paste stuff from the comfort of your couch.

It's an InfraRed system so you will need a clear view between sender and reciever. In my case i taped the reciever part on top of my tv. Works perfectly. Highly recommended.

__________________Now that I have children I can see how tuned they are to the world. Living crystals tuned to all manner of frequencies. And how urgently they need to be heard. They look up and they say, look at me. And I put my phone away.

@marloyd
That's a great looking cooker. I've never even heard of that type of turkey cooker. Years ago we used to smoke turkey in the old style Weber round top grill, but it took a while.

Hi Kerry, Yes both are watercooled the top one is a Swiftech H-20-330 Edge Kit with a top mounted Rad and the bottom one is a Corsair enclosed unit. Both water cooled and temp at idle ate about 20C and at full load after gaming or transcoding for an hour about 55C.

Following marloyd's cooker . I have one like this but an older model . I just got a picture from their site.
Brinkman Smoker charcoal.
You can smoke two turkeys with it at the same time. The drawback is it takes about 14 hours . If you don't want that too intense unburned charcoal taste you need to prestart some while the cooking is going on. That way you can add grey ashed ones to the coal pan of the smoker . I add some soaked hickory chips about every hour .
I have decided that turkeys take too long though. I like Cornish game hens about a 3 hour smoke does them excelent. You can also smoke some pork chops at the same time . They only take about 2 hours or you can leave them 3 if you like .

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This is for one of my favorite computer accessories, my Logitech M510 wireless mouse.

I've been using a Logitech mouse on my main computer for many years, as they seem to have the best build quality and fit my hand better than any of the competition. This latest one, the M510 has been the best I've used so far.

Here's what she looks like:

I have large hands, so finding a mouse that fits properly has been an issue. The gaming models that Logitech offers are slightly larger and more annoying with their multiple buttons, but fit fairly well. This one is smaller and is right on the edge of what I would normally choose, but after using it for a while I have come to like this mid sized model. The other good thing about the M510 is its cost, which is half what they want for the gaming models, and I found mine at a 50% off sale as well, so for $17 this was a steal.

The usb receiver is tiny, and I've found that it is not quite as receptive as the older Logitech receiver I had, but it works very well from my usb hub. Another good point with this mouse is its battery use. It just never seems to run out of power and I've still got the original AA batteries in it.

The buttons seem to be doing well, the middle button/scroll wheel functions properly....I just don't have any complaints with this mouse so far.

This is for one of my favorite computer accessories, my Logitech M510 wireless mouse.

I've been using a Logitech mouse on my main computer for many years, as they seem to have the best build quality and fit my hand better than any of the competition. This latest one, the M510 has been the best I've used so far.

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The DELL UltraSharp 2412M is an 24 inch LED backlit IPS monitor with a native resolution of 1900x1200 pixels, which gives a screen aspect ratio of 16:10.

The 2412M also has a good level of connectivity. With DisplayPort, DVI, and VGA connections for connecting to graphics cards, and both DisplayPort and DVI are HDCP compliant. However, there is no HDMI connector.

The 2412M also sports a 4 port USB2 hub, with 2 USB2 ports on the rear, and a further two on the left hand side of the screen, which I’m finding very useful for connecting a USB pen drive.

The mounting stand has an excellent range of adjustment, which covers the displays height, tilt and swivel. You can also rotate the display a full 90 degrees and use the 2412M is portrait mode.

Being LED backlit, the display runs very cool, and is also very energy efficient, consuming a maximum of 37 watts.The LED backlights also means the display is very slim.

With an IPS panel you would expect the UltraSharp 2412M to have good viewing angles, and it certainly doesn’t disappoint in this department, as you can view the screen at some very steep angles without the display becoming washed out.

After calibrating the display, I have been using the 2412M for a few weeks now. Text is sharp and very easy to read, and pictures look fantastic, and I’m seeing colours that I didn’t know existed when compared to my old Samsung LCD screen.

Despite the UltraSharp 2412M having an aspect ratio of 16:10, it has no problems at all in displaying 16:9 HD movies, where the picture quality is awesome, with dark blacks and vibrant colours, without ever becoming over-saturated.

Colour bleeding is just visible in the corners of the screen when the screen is filled with red (for example), but under normal operation and use, this isn’t evident.

I used to have an UltraSharp Dell monitor, and one of the things I remember about it was how strong the base was, and how convenient it was to adjust. Not to mention the useful usb ports. Good to know that hasn't changed for the worse in the Dell business class monitors.

I know the main point of this monitor is its IPS panel, and I have to admit I wouldn't mind trying one. But I've gotten used to more real estate, and I think I'd have to move to a 27" model which is beyond my means I'm afraid.

Thanks for the review Dee. By the way, here is a pic for anyone interested:

I have two of these . One has a 500GB & the other a 1TB hard drive .
They have worked well with my Sharp Aquos TV which has a USB port .
I'm sure the decoding is done by the TV but the picture quality is better than from a DVD disc. I can just open a VIDEO_TS folder & the movie plays from the .vobs .There is a very short blink between .vobs.
I have also played .avi & .mkv & some others this way .
Rosewill Docking Station RX-DU101

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I have to admit, I've been very reluctant to buy anything with the Rosewill name. I know Newegg has a pretty good return policy, but Rosewill seems to be spread out pretty far in what they put their name on. Which leads me to suspect the quality in some of their products. I just don't see them keeping close control over all their suppliers.

Glad your docking stations are working well for you. Can your Sharp TV handle HD resolution files from the hard drives also, or have you tried?

@ Kerry56 ,
This is the only Rosewill product I have right now .
I would have tried HD resolution but I don't have a source that would be 1080I or P.
A regular DVD couldn't actually be improved to that level.
Or would the usual 720 of a standard commercial DVD be enough to create HD resolution?
The .VOB files are direct uncompressed rips to DVD9 . I don't think there is anything I could do to those files that will improve them.
The manual for this TV doesn't cover what the USB capabilities are very well .
It runs this through it's multi-media screen & that one doesn't show the resolution when the "Info" button is pushed. Everything else does including my "upconverting" DVD player when used with this TV. Which actually has a better picture from component than HDMI .
Both show 1080P as their top resolution.
The TV is a Sharp Aquos LC-46LEOUT .
All I know is the picture from the Rosewill & it's hard drive have the best quality.
Better than any DVD player/recorder unit I have.
I don't have any bluray equipment at this time.

@ bean55 . I've had mine about a year now & so far no complaints . I even made a couple of hard drive "covers" to use with them.

No, you'd have to start with something greater than normal dvd resolutions. There are sample clips and trailers in HD that can be downloaded if you want to test playback. Here are a couple of spots for those clips:http://www.h264info.com/clips.html